Scan Image Text URL

Metered / request

POST/v1/scan-image-text-url

Extract text from a public camera trap image URL and return structured fields when they can be detected.

Try in playground

Parameters

Required

string

Public image URL. Fetched image limit is 10 MB.

Request notes

Send JSON only. Private IPs and internal targets are blocked. Fetched images must be 10 MB or smaller.

Response fields

string

Required. Full raw text extracted from the image before structured parsing.

string (YYYY-MM-DD)

Optional. Detected and normalised date from the image overlay.

string (HH:MM:SS, 24h)

Optional. Detected and normalised time from the image overlay.

{ value: number, unit: "C" | "F" }

Optional. Primary detected temperature value.

{ value: number, unit: "C" | "F" }

Optional. Secondary detected temperature in alternate unit when available.

{ value: number, unit: "%" }

Optional. Detected relative humidity.

{ value: number, unit: string }

Optional. Detected barometric pressure and its unit.

string

Optional. Detected moon phase (normalised snake_case label).

string

Optional. Detected camera brand based on known camera patterns.

string

Optional. Detected camera model based on known camera patterns.

{ current: number, total: number }

Optional. Detected burst position such as frame 2 of 3.

Status codes

200OCR and metadata extraction completed.

400Validation error or blocked URL target.

401Invalid, missing, or revoked API key.

403Active API billing required in the normal API.

402Free monthly quota used up and no active API billing, or API keys paused.

413Fetched image is too large.

429Rate limit exceeded.

500Unexpected internal server error.

503OCR provider temporarily unavailable.

Notes

Fields not found during extraction are omitted from the response.
Optimised for camera trap overlays. For other text, use raw_text.
Public API keys can still test OCR inside the docs playground only; that exception does not apply to direct /v1 calls.

Examples

Node.js / Express

const response = await fetch('https://api.animaldetect.com/v1/scan-image-text-url', {
  method: 'POST',
  headers: {
    Authorization: 'Bearer ' + process.env.ANIMAL_DETECT_API_KEY,
    'Content-Type': 'application/json',
  },
  body: JSON.stringify({
    url: 'https://example.com/camera-trap.jpg',
  }),
})

const data = await response.json()

Example response

{
  "raw_text": "BUSHNELL 2026-02-12 09:17 PM 59F",
  "date": "2026-02-12",
  "time": "21:17:00",
  "temperature": { "value": 59, "unit": "F" },
  "camera_brand": "bushnell"
}

Previous: Scan Image Text Next: Species Getting started Rate limits